Thamsanqa “Thami’ Shongwe is WearCheck’s new in-house instrument technician. Armed with a national diploma in electrical engineering (light current), and several years of experience as an electronic technician, a production technician and a repair technician – this has stood him in good stead to ensure that he is highly instrumental in keeping the company’s laboratory equipment operating accurately and efficiently.

Thami is responsible for maintaining all the instruments in 15 of the 16 WearCheck laboratories - those that are situated on the African continent.

Dennis Swanepoel – WearCheck’s reliability solutions consultant, Mobius trainer and CAT IV graduate – just returned from the latest CBM (Condition Based Monitoring) Conference in the Middle East, where he conducted four different presentations for delegates from all over the globe.

The sessions run by Dennis included two one day presentations - Animated Introduction to Vibration Analysis and Practical Vibration Analysis, and two 45 minute presentations titled Time Waveform Setup Fundamentals and Practical High Frequency Demodulation.

WearCheck MD Neil Robinson says the company is proud of Dennis. ‘It is a great honour to be invited to present to such high-calibre delegates on highly technical issues. These topics are Dennis’ areas of expertise, and we are delighted that he is gaining international recognition for his in-depth reliability solutions knowledge.’

To add to the honour, Dennis is currently serving a year-long term as an editorial board member of the international organisation CBMConnect, which is run by the Mobius Institute. The board is made up of nine industry thought leaders from around the world and is tasked with guiding condition-based maintenance multimedia content for CBM professionals.

Image right: Dennis Swanepoel is on the editorial board for CBMConnect this year, run by the Mobius Institute. Here, he discusses vibration analysis with another delegate at the CBM conference in the Middle East in April.

WearCheck will once again be exhibiting at African Utility Week (AUW), which takes place in Cape Town from 14 to 16 May 2019. We will be at stand H6 – please come and meet us.

We offer specialist condition monitoring services across many industries, including the electrical/power generation sector. Our Transformer Chemistry Services division and our Reliability Solutions division will be showcased at AUW.

We believe that, to minimise maintenance costs, it is critically important to boost the health of components, including transformers, engines, gearboxes and electric motors. Optimum health of components is achieved through regular assessment and used oil analysis. Examination of the physical condition of components helps avoid unplanned failure, while transformer health is monitored through regular assessment of insulating fluid.

Compared with the cost of unplanned machinery failure, investment in regularly-scheduled oil testing is a cost-effective and sound maintenance practice that helps optimise the life of components. Other condition monitoring techniques include vibration analysis, balancing, alignment, motor circuit analysis and thermography.

Four more of WearCheck’s RS (reliability solutions) technicians recently passed their CAT certification through the Mobius Institute, which is a worldwide provider of education in reliability improvement, condition monitoring and precision maintenance. This follows the ten WearCheck technicians who gained their CAT certification earlier this year.

WearCheck is the certified Mobius training centre for Africa, and courses are run for WearCheck customers anywhere, any date, on demand.

Technicians who gained their CAT 111 certification are Alastair Mac Gillicudy and Roeloff Hoffmann, while those who earned their CAT 11 certification are Reinier Kalp and Stephanie du Plessis.

CAT 11 students underwent a compulsory 18-month practical experience, followed by four days of lectures and a full day examination. CAT 111 students had to complete a 36-month practical experience, lectures for four days and examinations.

Vibration database setup and fault analysis are the predominant focus of both CAT 11 and CAT 111. The training sessions are practical and hands-on, enabling the technicians to hone their skills and progress to the next level.

In July, Quentin Gustav von Kleist joined WearCheck’s team in Johannesburg as a technical support consultant. Quentin brings with him a wealth of experience in the preventive maintenance arena, with particular knowledge of the mining industry and related components.

Prior to joining WearCheck, Quentin spent many years working in India for zinc and lead mines such as Hindustan Zinc, where he maintained mining machinery and repaired inoperative components. Armed with certification in the fundamentals of lubrication and oil analysis, Quentin and his team ensured that a large and varied range of equipment in the mines operated at peak performance, including dump trucks, loaders, drill rigs, raised bores, beamers, cutters, drill rods, stabs and more.

Quintin is already firmly-established in the WearCheck team that is on hand to assist customers with any technical support queries.

For many years, WearCheck has supported the children of St Vincent’s orphanage in Mariannhill with a range of different CSI projects, and this year was no different. The children were given a delicious snack pack each, and various items were donated, including much-needed school shoes. Money for the project was donated by WearCheck staff members, and the company matched what was collected from the staff.

Merry Christmas! the children at St Vincent’s orphanage in Mariannhill and staff from WearCheck Pinetown celebrate the donation of items such as school shoes and other essential goodies as well as a yummy snack pack for each child

The role played by on-load tap changers (OLTCs) in power generation is a critical one, which requires that they perform at their peak output during operation and unscheduled failure is avoided at all costs.

Regular maintenance coupled with condition monitoring such as oil analysis is now recognised as essential to help avoid unplanned outages for OLTCs. One of the key predictive maintenance tests that is conducted is DGA (dissolved gas analysis).

Technical Bulletin 66 unpacks the fine points of DGA, discusses the interpretation of results and what action to take when different amounts and ratios of various gases are present.

Three interesting case studies are discussed, in order to demonstrate the effectiveness of DGA in OLTCs.

Accounting, Thabani…Thabani Dlamini is WearCheck’s accounts assistant and holds a BTech degree in cost management accounting. He is currently studying for his certificate in CIMA.

Before joining the WearCheck family at the end of 2017, Thabani served as finance assistant at a medical company.

At WearCheck, he is responsible for many accounting processes, including processing invoices, controlling manual delivery notes, updating credit limits and more.

Thabani works in a slightly unusual situation, as he is currently the only man in a department of six ladies!

Capturing, Bianca…Bianca Louw recently joined the WearCheck family as the data capturer at the WSL (WearCheck Specialty Lab). She is primarily responsible for uploading data from samples that have been tested in the lab onto Giza, the computer software that manages the database.

Bianca, who is currently in the process of completing her diploma in analytical chemistry, began her career as a junior quality technician for an international coffee processing company before joining WearCheck.

WearCheck is proud to announce that we have signed a partnership agreement with Valvoline to do their oil analysis in Africa and the Middle East.

Says Steven, ‘Condition monitoring training adds value to an operation in several ways. As well as aiding maintenance staff to keep machinery running at optimum output, thereby maximising their investment in the oil analysis programme, the training course give enhanced insight to product developers. For example, Cummins and Valvoline have indicated that they will use the information from the condition monitoring courses to fine-tune their engines and lubricants at the developmental stage, adapting design and composition to help minimise future wear.’

Lubrication specialists Valvoline sent a team for condition monitoring training with WearCheck’s technical manager Steven Lumley (fourth from left). Also on this course was a team from Fleetgard, a division of Cummins that supplies filtration for Valvoline.